


the 99 times kamilah mourned

by flcv



Category: Bloodbound (Visual Novel)
Genre: Angst, Character Death, F/F, Grieving, Mourning, blood mentions, second chapter gets better i promise
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-25
Updated: 2020-08-21
Packaged: 2021-02-27 14:29:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,525
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22408720
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flcv/pseuds/flcv
Summary: (and the one time her prayers were answered)
Relationships: Kamilah Sayeed/Main Character (Bloodbound)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 38





	1. Chapter 1

Love, for Kamilah, came in different shapes over the two thousand years of her existence. 

In the playful little games she used to play with her brother, both of them musing up their hair and clothes more often than not. As they grew up, it was replaced with more adult concerns, along with the ones brought by the incoming war. Yet, they always made time for each other.

In the arms of a menace of a man, one she was Queen to. He was her King, and together they reigned. Their love burned for centuries, it’s flames reaching higher, fueled by bloodlust in every meaning of the word. 

In the arms of many lovers, men, and women alike. Vampire or not, it did not matter who she took to bed that night. Sometimes, she dared her heart to love someone other than her King. Then, her love came in night escapades, horseback riding throughout the forest with the ones who dared to accompany her, as a muse for many paintings and sculptures and sometimes as the one displaying affection for her lover in the form of art. 

One thing she learned, however, was that what came went, too. 

The time with her brother turned into praying over an empty grave, candied figs as offerings. He used to love them so much, maybe, she pondered, he’d be enticed to come back one last time to taste them.

Her King let his ideas of grandeur dominate him, and as the flame diminished Kamilah saw the ashen remains of who she used to be - compassionate and justice driven - and took one good look at herself and decided she wouldn’t be manipulated on her rage anymore. 

The lovers became more common, and she found pleasure in dominating this time around. For the first time, she found power through passion rather than war. She changed, even if only after centuries. The Queen was still loyal to her King, but bedding him became something more sparse and usually done in the company of whoever joined in. Gaius was handsome, enticing. Love became lust, a search for power under his shadow rather than alongside him.

As her lovers died, either from old age, sickness, accidents, murder, and many other factors she didn’t have enough fingers to count on, Kamilah built walls around her heart. The only one who still had an influence on her was her King, as much as she’d sworn he no longer controlled her.

Even he, however, died by her own blade eventually.

And then, there was her.

Oh, she was absolutely ravishing in every way. Her smile was contagious, her skin soft, her eyes so deep Kamilah felt herself get lost in another being for the first time in a long while.

Adrian had warned her, like a friend and like family, like someone who’d seen nearly every side of her, that his newest assistant could easily mean more grieving for Kamilah. He couldn’t quite place it yet, but the girl was different. She seemed to attract trouble, but she always got herself so seemingly effortlessly out it. Her naivety looked more like a mask each day that passed, and even what she didn’t know, she learned quickly. Still, he feared, no, he knew, that one day her luck would run out and it’d leave Kamilah broken once again.

He would look at her before every mission they’d go on, and her eyes betrayed the stone-cold facade. Before, even he had trouble seeing through it, and he’d learned to call her sister the last century. This meant one thing: she was letting her walls down.

The sad looks turned into desperate kisses as their adventures grew more dangerous and their love stronger. Adrian feared for Kamilah now and warned her again. She dismissed him, and told him plainly there was no point in living millennia if she let a woman like her go. He realized then, this love burned much stronger than the one he saw between her and his previous master. If he concentrated enough, he could almost see the charged energy between them, the flame bright blue as it burned and consumed.

Blood. So much of it. It matched everyone’s eyes as they watched, transfixed on the scene before them. Adrian almost didn’t, but he dared to look at Kamilah then. She looked devastated, pure shock keeping her upright. The man she’d loved for nearly two thousand years and the woman who’d turned her whole world upside down, nearly chest to chest, impaling each other. Both deadly wounds.

As Gaius turned to bark, and she fell to the floor, Kamilah fell with her, her eyes producing tears for the first time in centuries as she held her close. She tried to get some words in, and Adrian nearly winced as she saw the ‘I love you’ leave her lips. By his assistant’s expression, a sad smile gracing her lips as she was taken under, it was the first time she’d said it, too.

After five seconds of staring at her limp body, Kamilah glanced at Adrian, then at everyone else, her red eyes scanning each gaze before turning her attention back to her beloved.

“Don’t stop me.” 

And no one did, as she Turned her, her body convulsing with sobs.

They kept her in a coffin for a few hours. It didn't work. She remained dead. Then a day, and Adrian saw Kamilah place her walls back up, yet her eyes remained sorrowful. No one expected her to come back at this point, and Adrian warned Kamilah one last time that she wouldn't be coming back, that it was best to say her goodbyes and not prolong her suffering. 

They held a funeral, at Lily's request. One last human tradition after being taken away by someone so monstrous, no humanity was left in him. Adrian watched, from afar, as Kamilah was the one to close the casket and lower her into the ground, looking like she wanted to join her onto a different kind of eternal life. 

Later that night, they talked over a bottle of a much-needed finely aged wine. Kamilah had stopped crying but somehow looked even worse. Her eyes were looked pained, her expression heavy, and saddest of all, heartbroken. 

"Is it selfish to only pray when calamity strikes? I've long lost the faith in something higher, but these past few hours I've been dreaming of an heaven I'd be able to join her in." 

And Adrian understood. He looked at the locker, his family, every day. He wished he could join them too if immortality got tired of him and he was still, somehow, pure in the eyes of a God.

"Maybe… It is quite normal though, I assure you."

She paused for a long while, staring ahead, and just when Adrian thought she wouldn't be speaking again, she did. 

"You told me so. That this would end. That we'd have this talk.* She let out a long sigh, looking up as if she'd be listening from somewhere up there. "That I'd miss her." 

"She was an amazing woman, Kamilah. She's already made our history books. She… died happy, too."

Her voice took on a bitter, sad edge to it. "She died happy, and I feel like I'm dying a little each minute that passes. I haven't felt this. . . Since Lysimachus died. And even then, I was focused on revenge. I didn't have a body to mourn. Now, I just feel empty. There's nothing I can do other than accept she's gone." 

“Kamilah…”

“No Adrian. Do not pity me. Humans are fragile. Even we are fragile, you saw how even Gaius was able to die when we thought it impossible. You warned me too, but even if you hadn’t, I’d warned myself enough. We should have had her debriefed. Let her live a normal life. But it’s too late now, and we can only carry on her memory.” 

She looked at him, finding solace in his warm eyes as she raised a glass of red wine to her lips, her last words quiet with mourning.

“I know I will.”


	2. Chapter 2

Central Park was always too big for Kamilah's liking. On her night walks, she always felt like prey walking right in the middle of her predator’s territory. Big areas like this always meant two things: many places to hide, yet too many open ones. 

After the war installed by Gaius, her dislike for it only grew. Ferals were everywhere, blood and dead humans covering the green grass a sickly red, swirling with putrid blacks and browns. Even on the two thousand years with her old King, she'd never seen such a post-apocalyptic scenario. She wasn't, however, surprised it was him that brought it on. He always had a knack for making history in all the wrong ways. 

Thinking about him only served as fuel to her rage, keeping its flames burning higher than her love for  _ her _ . Gods above, it was hard. The only moments she wasn't immobilized with grief were the ones in which she was killing, succumbed to her most primal instincts. Lily had joked she'd end the feral crisis single-handedly at this rate. She'd shared a dry laugh, yet as the days passed and her kill count reached the hundreds, it was becoming a reality. She didn't bother to clean her suits anymore, sending them straight to the garbage. They came back soiled in blood and guts. Not even the most meticulous of dry cleanings could save them. 

There was suddenly a lull in the number of ferals, and while Kamilah found it weird, she didn't question it. She supposed she deserved some rest. As soon as she sat down on a bench, she realized why she didn't do breaks anymore. 

She could almost feel her thigh touching hers, one hand around her waist, the tickle of her hairs against her collarbone. The intoxicating smell of her perfume and her blood, the steady humdrum of her heart, skipping a beat whenever Kamilah nibbled at her ear or squeezed a little tighter. Her big doe eyes staring back at her, molten pools of her soul, cracking any walls that came in between their gazes. This woman was intoxicating, her love addicting. Kamilah was starting to think Jax used the right metaphor when comparing her to a drug because she was suffering severe withdrawal. 

And then, she didn't  _ almost  _ feel, she  _ felt _ . She was there. As far as Kamilah knew, she wasn't delusional. Yet. She was assaulting her senses, her scent hundreds of times stronger than in her imagination. Then, her eyes caught the shift of the light on her hair and the vampire snapped her head towards her now red eyes. 

Hours later, they shared a bath after shedding some relieved tears, washing away the remnants of her grave, watching them swirl down the drain with blood as she trailed her hands down her sides, committing her curves to memory. 

(Because yes, Kamilah couldn't bear to be away from her, her brain jumping to farfetched causes of death reminiscent of the late night shows she used to binge with her lover - maybe she'd trip and fall right on the faucet, impaling herself through the heart. Who knew, right?) 

But irrational worrying aside, the older vampire was  _ relieved _ . She’d only just made peace with her lovers’ departure, just finished painting the heavy walls around her heart back into a semblance of herself, and back she came tearing them all down with a single look. Not that Kamilah minded, she’d much rather have her heart open and vulnerable with that incredible woman by her side than spending the rest of her life like the past few days had been.

“Kamilah?” 

Her voice held innocence and curiosity that she didn’t deem possible after all they’d been through, and the way she called her name was nothing short of bewildering each and every time, especially after so long without hearing it.

“Yes, my love?”

“Nothing. You seemed… lost. Wanted to call you back to me.” 

At that, Kamilah let out a pained chuckle.

“I was lost without you, love. So lost. My heart is full with your presence but my mind still hasn’t adjusted, I’m afraid.”

They both inched closer, their bodies fitting seamlessly together. The younger vampire silently pleaded to hear what was on her mind, and so she did.

“I know how nonsensical it is, but I feel like you’re going to wash away with the water. Or that we’ll head to sleep and by the morning you’ll be cold and lifeless and I’ll be lowering you to your grave shortly after. Or that- that insignificant man will barge through our home, somehow made flesh again, and turn you to bark instead.”

Kamilah could have gone on and on about her insecurities, but after a few examples it was all clear: she was afraid of losing her again, and she knew that if it were to happen it’d take an even bigger toll this time around. And then, Kamilah wouldn’t keep her promise to keep living in a world in which  _ her world _ was no more.

“I’m not going anywhere. I’ve beaten everything so far, haven’t I? Even death itself now, and I doubt it’ll be interested in me anytime soon. Something tells me my time isn’t up on this world, Kamilah, and neither is yours. Something does tell me, however, that our hardships are far from ending, but would it even be us if we could stop to smell the roses now? We fight, Kamilah, we don’t give up, and surely one day it’ll all pay off.” She took a deep breath, looking in her girlfriend’s eyes which were slowly but surely growing more resolute. “That being said, your fears aren’t ‘nonsensical’. I don’t know what I’d do if I lost you like you did me. Most probably, I would have taken my own life right there and then.”

“Love…”

“No, I’m not done. I applaud you for not doing so, I  _ want _ you to live. I’m so glad you’re here with me. But were it the other way around, you wouldn’t be coming back.”

“You weren’t supposed to resurrect either, and yet here you are. I _cannot_ make a promise to keep on living, knowing you’d take your life if mine wasn’t in the picture.  _ Promise _ me, please.” She sounded desperate, but she knew she wasn’t able to promise her something of that magnitude. If she were to lose her again, she was sure death would be more than welcome, and her lover knew that too.

“I’ll try. I promise to try.”

“I will, too.” It was barely a murmur as she kissed her for the umpteenth time that evening, holding her tight under the running water.

It was the hope of living another day that kept them going because they couldn’t afford certainty right then. But what Kamilah did know was that she was going to fall asleep with her girlfriend in her arms, unlike the past few days in which she’d been alone in a bed too big for only one person, and that was more than good enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it has been way too long since the last update, and a single paragraph of this chapter had been buried in my google docs, finally got to it today after months of 0 inspiration to continue this. it's short, and it doesn't really make up for the wait, but it's better than leaving this unfinished I think. does anyone even follow bloodbound stuff anymore? ;') anyways, hope you enjoyed it!

**Author's Note:**

> Kamilah is, hands down, one of the most intriguing characters in Bloodbound for me.  
> The whole fight with Gaius, putting the woman she loves (that is if you choose to romance her) in the hands of the man who shaped her into the worst version of herself... It was buzzing around in my head for days after I read the chapter. I just had to write something.  
> Hope you enjoyed it ;)


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